Tuesday 24 June 2014

Limericks 101

Limericks are awesome!!

I really enjoy writing limericks. They are actually surprisingly difficult to make, but once you get the hang of it it's not too bad.

Here are some examples of limericks. They are mostly quite well known ones.


There once was a young lady named Bright
Whose speed was much faster than light
She set out one day
In a relative way
And returned on the previous night
-Anonymous

There was a young lady of Niger
who smiled as she rode on a tiger;
They returned from the ride
with the lady inside,
and the smile on the face of the tiger.
-attributed to Edward Lear and William Monkhouse

A painter, who lived in Great Britain,
Interrupted two girls with their knittin'
He said, with a sigh,
"That park bench--well I
Just painted it, right where you're sittin.'"
-Anonymous

A flea and a fly in a flue
Were imprisoned, so what could they do?
Said the fly, "let us flee!"
"Let us fly!" said the flea.
So they flew through a flaw in the flue.
—Ogden Nash

So, how do you write a limerick? 

Well, you start off with a first line. That's always a good idea. The last word should be one that you can rhyme with easily [e.g. flue, Bright, smile, dot etc.] Keeping the first line to around eight or nine syllables is a good idea. Ten or more can get messy.

So here's my example first line. 

A king renowned for insanity

Now we need a second line. The second line needs to rhyme with the first line. [e.g. flue/do, Bright/light, smile/while, dot/not etc]

First and second line smushed together:

A king renowned for insanity
Across the broad reach of humanity

Great! It's coming along nicely! The next thing we need are third and fourth lines.
These lines should rhyme with each other, but not with the first or second lines. They should be complete different rhymes. 


Here we go:

A king renowned for insanity
Across the broad reach of humanity
Instigated this deception
(Which was an awful misconception)


Now we just need to think of a last line. This fifth line should rhyme with both the first and the second.


A king renowned for insanity
Across the broad reach of humanity
Instigated this deception
(Which was an awful misconception)
To feed his egregious vanity.


So there you go! We have our limerick! (Yes, I did write that limerick while I was doing this blog post. Do you like it?)

Let me know in the comments how yours turned out. :D I can't wait!


4 comments:

  1. That's cool! I like it. However I do have a suggestion to make which I think would make your limerick even better:

    The 3rd and 4th lines have a few to many syllables which make the poem not flow as well. I would suggest something like:

    A king renowned for insanity
    Across the broad reach of humanity
    Began this deception
    (A huge misconception)
    To feed his egregious vanity.

    I think that flows a little better, but then again it takes out some of the long and cool words you had there which made the poem more humourous, so... anyway I hope that helps. :)

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for your advice, Matthew. I do agree that the third and fourth lines are better if they are short and snappy. I will try to do that next time. I guess mine (which was the example one) should be a perfect example, lol!

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  2. My personal favourite limerick is:

    A dozen, a gross, and a score
    Plus three times the square root of four
    Divided by seven
    Plus five times eleven
    Is nine squared and not a bit more

    12 + 144 + 20 = 176
    176 + (3 x 2) = 182
    182 / 7 = 26
    26 + (5 x 11) = 81
    81 = 9^2 + 0

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Haha thanks for sharing that one, David!! It's brilliant!

      Delete

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